Thursday, September 12, 2013

Barbie Beefsteaks

Every Spring, Alan puts on his diggin' clothes and heads out to the alley to "turn over the soil" in our little garden plot. You know the story if you've ever planted a garden with visions of vine-ripened tomatoes dancing in your head. Fertilizer...plants...tomato cages...ka-ching...ka-ching...ka-ching. Plant...plant...plant... Then, you wait. And wait.

Thanks to a man who works with my husband, we'll just call him Kirk T, the best way to get those 'maters to pollinatin' is to "encourage" the blossoms with an electric toothbrush. You guessed it. One afternoon I found Alan on our Back 40 encouraging some pollination with one of our pricey little Sonicaire toothbrushes. "It really works!!" exclaimed 'Mater Pollinator. "That's really gross! That had better not be my brush!" exclaimed Grimacing Wife. "I'm gonna rinse it off," 'Mater Pollinator promised.

Granted our suburban manor sits on less than a quarter acre of land, but still we take daily strolls we like to call Walking the Property. "Come on, Mama! Let's Walk the Property!" "Wait a minute, Daddy! Let me grab my sweet tea!" We check the flower beds and the potted plants. The grand finale is checking on our pricey tomato garden.

This year we planted 6 tomato plants of various kinds none of which can I recall the name of unless I trot my little body out the back door, through the gate and into the alley. Suffice it to say, the majority of the tomatoes are cherries.

Little bitty teeny tiny eensy weensy cherries.

Over the past few weeks, we have harvested handfuls of these tiny little gems. Alan likes to just eat 'em as he picks 'em. I would like to leave them for the birds. They are mostly thick skin with a little bitty teeny tiny eensy weensy bit of actual tomato. Rather tart.

Today we dubbed this hybrid specimen the Barbie Beefsteak Tomato.

There you have it. The fruit of our labor and ka-chings. A bumper crop of Barbie Beefsteak Tomatoes. woo. hoo. I place all the blame on the Kirk T. Sonicare Pollination Method.